"Right-o!" declared the clerk, taking a long hook pole from the counter and starting for the other side of the store where the package goods were kept on the upper shelves.
Just as he reached the shelves, Meg called to him.
"Oh, Mr. Carroll," she began, meaning to ask him to bring a box of cornstarch, something Mother had written across the bottom of the list and which Bobby had overlooked when he read the list to Meg.
The clerk turned, his pole upraised, and Dot, who had been hanging over a flour bin nearly empty, slipped. Her feet flew up, her head went down, and she tripped the grocery clerk. His long pole crashed into the neat pile of boxes arranged on the shelves and a shower of oatmeal, cornstarch, macaroni and other cereals fell in an avalanche.
"I knew you'd do it," scolded Bobby, rushing forward, though of course he couldn't have known that Dot meditated such a catastrophe. In fact, that small girl was more surprised than any one else.
"I was just a-looking," she wept, when they pulled her out by her feet and she stood revealed with flour on her face and well rubbed into her dark hair and eyebrows, to say nothing of the hair-ribbon. "I was just a-looking in."
"There, there, I guess we're all right," stout Mr. Eustice, who owned the store, consoled her. "See, Dot, you're not hurt and Carroll here fell on a sack of grain which didn't break his bones. Not even one box is smashed, so why shed tears? 'Tisn't every little girl comes to see us who can say she's been in the flour bin."
Dot continued to sob while Mr. Carroll did up the oatmeal and the cornstarch and the other things and put them in Bobby's bag. She was still crying when the four little Blossoms went down the grocery store steps and turned toward the road that led home.
"I should think you would cry," said Meg severely. "I was so mortified! Can't you go anywhere, Dot, without falling into something?"
"Don't rub it in," whispered Bobby, feeling sorry for his little sister. Then he happened to get a good look at Twaddles, who had been suspiciously quiet ever since Dot's unfortunate accident.